The Washington Post covers the significance of a trip to Japan by U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates here. While we, the people, not the government, was paying attention to other things, Japan voted what for 50 years had been their opposition party into power, who then began to change the way Japan does things to try to work the country out of an economic and social “malaise” that has been going on for two decades.

Japan now is far less willing to defer foreign policy (meaning strategic) decisions to Washington and in that, and in a general trend towards independance from the U.S., are making themselves an issue the needs to be actively dealt with to ensure a continued strong alliance.

What we really don’t want, whether we know it or not, is to one day look up from our granola, or the most recent article on the demise of Pakistan or the rise of religious militants, or this year’s “American Idol” finale, to see that people who have been our good friends for a long time aren’t anymore, because we have been taking them for granted.